Embarrassment
by Callisto Nicol
Summary: Some words like tampon should not be said to some people like James Potter. [LJ ONESHOT]


Disclaimer: Not mine.

A/N: Written for Sarah Lily Potter Kavanagh to (hopefully) bring a smile to her face. Also, I did not have my favourite (…and only…) beta read it first because she is rather not home and I promised to post this tonight. (edit: I did track down Kel Kura and made her read it, though, so it's had a second opinion). Lastly, I so stole a line from Invader Zim. If you recognize it, GO GIR! If you don't recognize it, you're missing out. Also you can pretend it is my own genius. Ah, revel in my (fake) glory.

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Lily groped under her bed until her hand connected with her treasure: a box of tampons.

…An empty box of tampons.

Lily groaned.

Fortunately she lived at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, haven for young girls between the ages eleven and seventeen. She could just use somebody else's tampons until she could make an emergency trip to Hogsmeade.

Opening the door that connected her room to the Common Room, Lily announced: "My period has started and I need a tampon." This was the universal girl phrase that meant "sorry I've been moody this past week, but now I know it's because of hormones so will someone please help me end my misery?" It was a common occurrence in every girl dorm in which puberty had hit.

The problem Lily faced today, however, was the fact that she was Head Girl and shared a dorm with _only_ the Head Boy, who just happened to be sitting on a couch, clutching a quill, looking at her.

Great Mighty Merlin she was embarrassed. Of all the stupid times to let it slip her mind that she didn't live with a horde of girls…

"Er, Lily?" said Head Boy asked.

"Potter?" she asked back, her face flaming and her body temperature steadily rising.

"Do I look like a girl to you?"

"…Do you want an honest answer?"

He hesitated, tilting that cute head of his. "Yes," he said finally, obviously expecting her to smack him down with her tongue. Actually, that wasn't a bad idea, except that physical contact might shock him into an early death thanks to cardiac arrest, and such a…hormone induced…action… was so uncharacteristic of her and so unexpected from him that should he happen to survive, she would never live down the embarrassment, much like she feared she wouldn't live it down now.

"No. You don't look like a girl. I had a bit of a memory lapse. Pardon me please as I go DIE in my room."

That was three days ago.

Lily sat at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall next to her best mate Alice. She was carefully watching the doors, waiting for Potter to come through with his cronies. As expected he entered. Lily squeaked and tried to glue herself to Alice's side in such a way that no one would be able to see her looking from Alice's other side.

"Lily, stop being ridiculous. It's been three days and James hasn't said anything yet. I think you're making a bigger deal out of this than you need to," Alice said patiently, stuffing eggs in her mouth.

"Alice, if you'd said what I said to Frank before the two of you started dating, would you be sitting here letting me tell you you're making a bigger deal out of this than you should be?"

"Lily, if I had done what you did, I would have hung myself off the Astronomy Tower, making your argument null and void. Furthermore, this is not a hypothetical situation, it's a real one, so buck up at get over it. Not to mention the fact that you're taller than me and your head sticks out anyway."

Curse Alice and her short self. Lily risked a glance at Potter; he wasn't even looking at her. He was laughing with Black, probably giving an animated reenactment of her announcement. Stupid prat—he wasn't even pretending to be sensitive to her fragile ego. Sodding berk. He'd probably lost all interest in her after that night, putting a premature end to her fantasy of having his children. Not that she fantasized about it. Much. At all. More often than every History of Magic class period. That she happened to have twice a day.

"You know," Alice said, eating a slice of bacon, "you only care because you fancy him."

"I do not!" Lily hissed. "Take it back!"

"Don't care or don't fancy him?"

"…Both."

"Liar."

"But a happy liar. I like my delusions, thank you very much."

Stupid sparkling Alice eyes. Lily hated smug best mates. Good for nothing, that's what they were! Unless you wanted to be mocked. Then they were useful. Lily, however, was not partial to being mocked.

She snuck another glance at Potter. He was having a thumb war with Remus. Really, now, why was he thumb-warring Remus? Remus had unnaturally long fingers and squashed everybody—Cheat! Cheat! Potter stepped on Remus' foot! It was against the rules to cheat against a decent bloke like Remus! Cheating against scoundrels like Black, however, was perfectly acceptable, but Remus deserved better!

Mm, Potter had nice hands. Lily couldn't help but wonder if he would let her thumb-war against him with the ulterior motive of caressing his hands. Not that she would—ask to thumb-war, that is. She definitely would caress.

"Lily, sweet, he's not going to look down here just because you're staring."

Lily blushed as she turned her eyes to Alice. "I'm not staring, Alice, I'm—I'm—I'm studying."

Alice cocked an eyebrow, a useful trick she'd picked up from Lily. Lily was rather proud of it because she'd picked it up from Black who used it to frustrate Potter who couldn't seem to make just one brow go up at a time. It was fun watching him try, though. Lily never before knew it was possible to make that many expressions with one face.

Her blushed deepened, but she ignored Alice and turned to her own breakfast. Great. Her cereal was now soggy. It never failed to amaze her that witches and wizards had spells for floating a feather but couldn't manage a spell for protecting cereal from going soggy. Cereal needed a good crunch.

Alice propped her head on her hand, her elbow resting on the table. "Lily, why don't you just go talk to him?"

Lily raised her eyes disbelievingly. "Alice."

"Lily."

"Alice. I asked him for a _tampon_. That indicates a level of comfort suitable for a _relationship_ which we not only don't have, but will never have. He has something to hang over my head now! I practically screamed I LOVE YOU JAMES POTTER."

"You asked him for a tampon. How does that scream love?"

"Besides being embarrassing?" ("A surefire sign of love," Alice said mockingly.) "It screams I'm comfortable with him. I'm _comfortable._ I'm _used_ to him. He's becoming a fixture in my life! I don't mind treating him like part of my everyday life!"

"…You fancy him, meaning you _want_ him to be part of your every day life."

"Alice, he is James Potter. James. Potter. And I am Lily Evans. We're like oil and water!"

"Peanut butter and jelly."

"God and Satan!"

"Ham and cheese."

"Dumbledore and Voldemort!"

"Cake and ice cream."

"Peas and potatoes!"

"Black and blue."

"Pretty sunsets and walks along the beach!"

"Made for each other," they ended together. Lily realised what she said and made a face.

"You tricked me," she accused.

"You're the one who said it," Alice replied with a shrug.

Lily snuck another look at Potter. He still wasn't looking her way. She sighed. What did it take to make him look? Just, just once. That was all she wanted.

Alice rubbed Lily's shoulder in sympathy. "At least we know you aren't too embarrassed to still be lovesick."

"It serves me right," Lily said with a sigh. "Now I know how he felt all those years I rejected him. Is this cosmic justice? Or is this just God laughing at me? It's because I have red hair, isn't it? Everybody hates the redheaded stepchild—no, don't point out that I'm nobody's stepchild. I'm being moody and depressed which I can blame on either being lovesick or being on my period."

"Why don't you go explain being moody because of your period to James?" Alice asked, nudging Lily and with a suggestive smile on her face. "Goodness knows he should be used to it by now."

Lily smacked Alice.

"Ow! Abuse! I'll sic my boyfriend on you!"

Lily just stuck her tongue out.

"Look out, Lily! James is coming our way!"

"HIDE ME!" she screeched, trying to duck under the table.

"Hey, Evans. Didn't know Prongs gave you complexes."

"Oh, my mistake, it's just Sirius," Alice said, sounding for all the world as if she were discussing laundry.

Lily sat back up and smacked Alice again.

"Ow! Second abuse! You're evil!"

"Girls, girls, no need to fight over my presence," Black said, taking a seat and lounging gracefully. Lily secretly envied his ability to look cool regardless the situation (not that she would ever admit it out loud or even in the forefront of her mind). "There's more than enough of me to go around."

"Does your best mate know you talk to Lily like that?" Alice asked.

"No, and I'd thank you to keep my flirtations to yourself. I rather like all my body parts attached and my hair untouched." He did have pretty hair. Another feature of Black's Lily secretly admired—his hair. It was so sleek and shiny and pretty (and soft, although nobody knew she knew that—she would never admit she had secretly ran her hands through his hair one day when she found him asleep on the couch. She could just imagine the ensuing conversation with Potter okay, monologue BY Potter: "You love my best mate! WHY, MY LILY, WHY? I LOVEDED YOU LILY, I LOVEDED YOU!" followed by the tragic murder of one Sirius Black and tragic demise of James Potter). "I actually came over here on a mission, ladies. My best mate would like to know why his delicious and delectable Head Girl has been avoiding him."

Lily blinked. "You're kidding me, right?"

"No."

"Don't give me that crap, Black," Lily said sourly. "He knows why I'm avoiding him and you know, too, because he told you and you were _laughing_ at me mere minutes ago!"

"Sorry, Evans, but you're mistaken. We're all confused."

Lily narrowed her eyes.

Sirius held his hands up. "No joke, Evans. I'm lost."

"Stop playing innocent, Black," she hissed. "You know good and well I asked Potter for a tampon."

A moment of silence ensued before Sirius sodding Black starting roaring with laughter.

"Prongs!" he hollered down the table. Oh. Oh no. This could only end in tears. Or blood. …Actually, it had started with blood. Merlin this was embarrassing. "Prongs! You didn't tell me she asked you for a tampon!"

Silence engulfed the entire Great Hall. Lily was absolutely positive that she had never been redder in her life. On the plus side, at least James hadn't made matters worse and told his best mates. Oh, no, Lily had done THAT one all by herself.

The silence was replaced by laughter. Loud, raucous laughter that rang in her ears and would forever echo in her dreams YEARS down the future. If she ever had them, her _children_ would suffer psychologically because of this experience.

Tears threatened to blur her vision as she stood up and made her way out of the Great Hall. She vaguely heard James call her name, but she ignored him as she escaped the taunting of her peers.

She would _never_ live this down. Social suicide, that's what this was.

A pair of arms encircled her waist and put a halt to her mad escape. She could tell by the touch that it was James (even though he'd never touched her like this before).

"Lily," he murmured, pulling her into a hug as she cried out her embarrassment (which was embarrassing in and of itself. She hated crying in front of other people. It was just…so…embarrassing).

He let her have a good cry before he started talking. "I know Sirius can be a prick sometimes, but he does have a good heart."

"Oh, sure, announcing I asked you for a _tampon_ is the _perfect_ example of a good heart."

"Look at the bright side, Lils—I didn't tell him, meaning your embarrassing moments are safe with me."

Lily gave a hiccup-laugh. "And that's supposed to make me feel better?"

"Yes," he said firmly, pressing a kiss into her hair. Lily about melted—lip contact! Granted, it was with her hair, but it counted!

Oh, wonderful. Her first kiss from James Potter and she had a red blotchy face, bloodshot teary eyes and enough embarrassment to last a life time.

…But she also had James Potter's arms around her, and that seemed to make up the difference.

"So I heard a rumour that you like me," James said, gently stroking her hair. "It would be rather nice if it's true, but it could be rather embarrassing for me if it's just a vicious lie. Care to shed some light on the situation?"

Lily turned in his arms so she was looking up at him. "I would answer with a kiss," she said, "but I'm rather lacking experience and I'd hate to embarrass myself."

James looked at her. "Did you just admit that you've never been kissed before?"

Her face flamed. "Excuse me while I go die of embarrassment for the third time is not quite as many days," she snapped, trying to wiggle out of his hold. She didn't get very far, at least not in distance. She got rather far with the lips and tongue dance, however. Mmm. A girl could get used to this…

"You know, I think I rather like inexperienced kissers," James said breathlessly an indefinite amount of time later, "because you get the satisfaction of knowing…" He trailed off, staring distantly in her direction.

"Satisfaction of knowing what?" Lily asked.

"Sorry, can't think when you're around," he said and kissed her again.

Nobody ever mentioned Lily's tampon comment around her. She suspected James' furnuculus curse might have had something to do with it, but she could never prove her suspicions.

One thing was sure, though—she was never embarrassed to have James as a boyfriend. In fact, she quite liked it, enough so that she said yes when he proposed and said I do when she walked down the aisle and said aww when their baby was born.

As for James, well, he always kept a tampon on hand after that, just in case his lovely lady needed one in a tight spot (although this _was_ a source of embarrassment, courtesy of one Sirius Black.)

Alice went on to marry her boyfriend, Frank, and was a source of embarrassment to nobody (except maybe Augusta Longbottom, but she wears a stuffed vulture on her hat so she really has no room to talk). Remus had a miserable few years (fifteen) before he met Nymphadora Tonks who was nothing but a source of embarrassment to him, and he loved every minute of it.

And Hogwarts stands still, surviving embarrassing situations of all kinds and shaping the future of the British wizarding world.

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A/N: I have a horrid time ending things. I did my best. Thanks for reading! If you have time, drop a review, and if you don't, click on my story several times so the stats number goes up. madcackle 'Till the next pointless story! Calli


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